tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18604893238176856142024-02-20T03:11:02.473-08:00International Rescue Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02230653032218435418noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1860489323817685614.post-21107922642313701652018-01-21T11:56:00.001-08:002018-05-29T05:37:39.573-07:00Part VI - Pai and Myanmar <div style="color: #454545; font-family: '.SF UI Text'; font-size: 17px; line-height: normal;">
<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Pai is a little hippy town in Thailand's northern highlands. Certainly one of my top five destinations so far. To get there, minibuses have to cross a mountain range and it's not for the faint hearted. Just as we were leaving, the driver handed everyone a small plastic bag. Always on the look out for a bargain, I grabbed a couple, 'Ooo free plastic bags, cool'. It was only later when the relentlessly windy mountain pass claimed its first vomit victim did I realise their true purpose. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">So I vomited in both immediately.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">One of Pai's best features is the nightly street food market. Every imaginable nationality of food is available, making dinner decisions surprisingly stressful. I say 'imaginable', incredibly there is no English Pie & Mash stall. Even if you don't like or want to cook pies, surely it's worth setting up shop for the plentiful pun opportunities alone. Also the town is crawling with hungry Brits potentially seeking a taste of home after weeks of Pai Pad Thai. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">NB: Could this be my calling; the job opportunity / glutton opportunity I've been craving?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Suandoi Backpacker Resort is a fitting name for such an expansive complex of chilled out brilliantness. Free yoga session every morning? Yes please. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Update: No thanks. I never actually made it to any sessions. Part illness, part late nights, mostly the discomfort caused by the basics: even the standard crossed leg sitting pose is troublesome. Anyway, I will cherish this place. We made some lovely American and English chums and had a lovely time. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Finally, after months of sleepless nights, cold sweats and Grace having to explain to strangers why her companion is slapping his body, slapping the table, I got that sweet sweet hit I had craved since records began (October 2nd): approximately 5mins behind a drumkit at Mojo Bar's Wednesday night Jazz & Blues jam. Ooo mumma it felt good. Laying down a groove for some old timers to sax, strum and keys all over. I even got my own solo. What a treat. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">With something you're passionate about, once you pop you just can't stop. However on this occasion, once I popped I just had to stop / was stopped by the MC. Frustratingly several drummers had showed up and time was a factor. Like an alcoholic given one solitary shot before being sent back to The Priory, I left the stage fruslated (frustrated and elated, look it up). </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">From Pai we made our way to back to Chiang Mai to fly on to our final Asian country, the much anticipated Myanmar. Every time I write 'Senior Researcher' in the 'occupation' box of each country's arrivals card, I get this worry that my former title is at best ambiguous and at worst conjuring up investigative journalism connotations. If questioned further at Immigration, I'm not sure how I would describe my previous job without mentioning the 'e' word - explosives. Not an ideal name-drop at any airport, let alone one in Myanmar, a recovering paranoid schizophrenic of a country. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Thought of the Day: </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">On entering each new country we Google the local currency exchange rate and the results so far have made for grim reading. In mid 2016 the once strong and proud pound collapsed like a disappointing soufflé, bumping up the price of our trip considerably. Even Myanmar's never ending military controversies (most recently genocidal) do not appear to have dented its currency to the extent that we have sabotaged our own with Brexit. Thanks again 'Vote Leave'. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">With the Rohingya Muslim genocide making front page news in the west, we witnessed the impact on tourism immediately. Our plane, which to be fair was a small, propeller driven one, wasn't even half full. Excluding our two cabin crew, I counted 27 passengers. It felt more like a coach load of school kids on a field trip, albeit an ambitious one. A Parisian passenger later gave me Myanmar's recent tourism stats. In 2016 there were 7-8 million arrivals and last year's forecast for 2017 had been 10 million, however this has since been recalculated down to 2-3 million. International tourist boycott back on it seems. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">The most messed up aspect of the country is the fact that the government does not control the military. They are two separate entities who function together in a sort of deluded synergy. As long as the latter has the weapons, the former cannot tell it what to do. Imagine if Theresa had no authority over our armed forces, who for years had been raping, pillaging and murdering Scots and / or Welsh with impunity. Yes yes not that useful or accurate an analogy I know. Still, it's a scary thought. NB: Not for the first time on this trip I'm considering myself incredibly fortunate to have been born into middle class 21st Century Britain. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">I feel it necessary at this point to justify this part of our trip. After all, the $50 each visa fee goes straight into government coffers, funding a military with the worst human rights record on the planet. We had indeed met backpackers who had recently canceled their Myanmar trips on moral grounds. For us, after a bit of research into ethical ways to travel and spend money in Myanmar, we decided we should still go. We would be helping none of the millions living in abject poverty by not supporting their fledgling tourism industry.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Plus, on a more selfish note and from what we have heard this former demi North Korea provides a different traveller experience and so, the opportunity to get into such a fascinating country before the global tourism tsunami makes landfall was just too good to miss. Indeed, some might say we've already missed the boat. Although a boat isn't necessarily where you want to be when a tsunami hits so yeah, take that uber backpackers. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Thought of the Day: Asians can't make pizza. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Ok yes there has been several occasions in the last three months that we have succumb to the culinary comfort zone of our European cousins. Before traveling I was all, 'I can't get enough of rice and noodles. Bring it on'. Well, they brought it on and it turns out, what they brought (unrelenting rice and noddles) was a bit much. On more than one occasion we have visited a restaurant boasting 'the best pizza in town'. And each time we've left disappointed. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">To be fair I should probably stop ordering the 12 inch rice noodle deep pan. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">On our first evening we wandered the blacked out back streets of Mandalay, the country's second city. There were people washing themselves in the street with buckets and aside from that the place seemed deserted. Our hostel host tells me that with the one exception of Yangon, there is actually no such thing as night life in Myanmar. By 22:00 all is eerily quiet, save for the wolf like cries of a million stray dogs prowling the urban jungle. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Although officially a democratically governed progress-making state, some old totalitarian paranoia persist. At each hostel 'Government Rule No.6'* requires foreigners to fill in a form with personal details and details regarding our previous and future plans. There is also a foreigner curfew law which means we all need to return to our registered accommodation by 11pm. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">*Rule 6? I like that this one seemingly insignificant rule relating to one specific industry within one of the least libertarian regimes ever has made it to the top 10 of Myanmar's rules. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Lying in bed on our first night I read about how up until very recently the private lives of the whole population were spied on and scrutinized by the state. For a fleeting moment a thought pops into my head and I scan the walls and ceiling for hidden cameras and microphones. Hmm. Perhaps that investigative journalist pipe dream is getting a bit out of proportion in my mind. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">With little time left before our second chapter - South America - we headed straight to Bagan, the centre of the ancient Kingdom of Began, where modern Burma began. This relatively small area of desert is littered with about 2,500 temples and smaller terra-cotta brick pagodas. Myanmar hasn't yet let UNESCO gets its protective / destructive claws into Began so you only need to ride a few minutes off the main roads before you are completely alone, skidding through desert sand past the numerous smaller pagodas many of which are crumbling and overgrown with grasses and cacti. The magic of this place then really becomes apparent. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">On day two we were alarmed, by our alarm, at a terrifying 4:30am! This was the starting whistle for the famous Bagan sunrise experience. Grace and I joined a possy of fellow hostelers riding off into the night on silent electric scooters. Our guides' favoured vantage point (several stories up on top of a pagoda) commanded a 360 degree view of the numerous domes penetrating dawn's mist. Lucky for us there were some spectacular clouds reflecting the sun's rays. A beautiful morning indeed and reminiscent of our Angkor Wat experience. Ancient religious architecture and morning sun is clearly a winning combo. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">The only shame is that I managed a pitiful two hours sleep in preparation. Was I out partying with the gap years till silly o'clock? No, I had stomach cramps and a heat itch attack. The latter being so ferocious I ended up texting my, in her words, 'Facebook Messenger GP' for advice at 2am. Thank you again Laura Storm, you're a life saver. Literally. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Thought of the Day:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Mobile reception antenna have been the bain of my purist brain on this trip. There's always at least one of the ugly bastards ruining each photogenic vista we come across. NB: you are technically traveling Oliver but don't forget you are also very much on the beaten track. If you want to go all Chris Columbus, hire a pedalo, head up the Amazon River and shut up. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">I read a Myanmar newspaper, state owned of course. That was a weird experience. In stark contrast to British print media, where each news exclusive is exclusively bad news, the New Myanmar Global Light is just a report on all the country's good news. Plus all its bad news reconstituted as good news. As Grace put it; 'progress progress progress'. I particularly endured, sorry enjoyed, the very last page; the sport section. It comprised one solitary full page article describing Myanmar beating Thailand in a college league football match. Nice one lads. Of course this does suggest that not one of Myanmar's adult professional sports teams won anything that week. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Enjoy of the Day: Bagan's tourist map. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Our hostel is located immediately opposite 'Shit Myathna Pagaoda'. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">If it's that bad, why advertise it?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Team Grolly is now so well versed in fellow backpacker small talk we finish each other's... </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">(Grace just shouted 'sentences'). It's really great traveling as a pair because you can share the (at times) tiresome verbal workload. Traveller doctrine states that one must regale each and every new hostel pal with the same well drilled spiel. Today I was telling a French guy about our time in Vietnam, however I needed the loo. Without even looking at Grace, I entered the ensuite, closed the door mid-sentence and immediately heard my ying or yang complete the anecdote to the exact same script, as I mouthed it into the mirror. Magic. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Fact of the Day: In 2008 a SIM card in Myanmar cost $30,000. By 2014 it was $1. This ridiculous tax was one of the ways the old military junta tried desperately to blinker the population and cling on to totalitarianism in the age of smart phones and the internet. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">We had heard a lot of good things about the Kalaow to Inle Lake trek and the trek itself plus the two nights staying in remote villages with Burmese families in their traditional farming huts was an amazing experience I will cherish. The crap pair of old trainers I thought were trek worthy, I will not cherish. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">The crisp mountain chill and rolling hills were actually reminiscent of my annual winter hols in the Lake District where, as a child, I was dragged around the beautiful countryside kicking and screaming until I finally began to appreciate the beauty of nature. The main difference here in eastern Myanmar is that the sky is consistently cloudless and we are currently walking through endless fields of little red crescent chilies. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Its harvest season and as such, millions of these little sickle cell fruits are spread out on tarpaulins, left out to the elements for a whole month before they are dry enough to sell. The fact that this so called "food" can be left unattended for so long in the presence of myriad fauna who won't go near it with a barge pole left me feeling vindicated. If the rest of the animal kingdom, not to mention the notoriously un fussy diners of the bacteria kingdom, don't want to unnecessarily ruin their curries why do so many bonkers humans? </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">We passed a few schools on our trek. Here's a strange comparison, the first grade kids were all wearing old colourful, patterned mismatching pjs and jumpers which reminded me instantly of East London. Wandering around Shoreditch, this same look adorns most twenty somethings. I believe it's called vintage. Seems to me that the less you apparently care (i.e really care) the better. The more ridiculously mismatching and old looking your outfit, the cooler you are? Which is why I will be pairing a caveman's loincloth with Henry VIII's pantaloons when I get back to London. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">On our trek I became wary of poverty porn. A sad phenomena most often propagated by celebrities wheeled out by charities to make painful TV adverts that at best completely miss the point and at worst cast African villagers as freaks to be gauped at. I witnessed another western tourist on a different trek with his phone on a selfie stick videoing an elderly lady just going about her business. He was stalking her like Attenborough witnessing a new species. Hmm. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">I was worried that staying in these villages would feel like we were at some sort of poverty theme park, like the favella tours you can go on in Rio. However, I'm pleased to say it wasn't like that. After all we felt pretty integrated; huddling round camp fires for warmth, outdoor bucket washes in the freezing cold, sleeping on the floor, toileting in an outhouse complete with earthen hole. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Our first night was a chilly wake up call for two tourists used to 30 degree jungles and beaches. The situation was thus; a wooden shed peppered with holes on the side of a mountain. For bed Grace had gone with her whole nuclear winter collection; vest, t shirt, her woolen jumper, my hoody, leggings, trousers, sleeping bag, blanket No.1 and blanket No.2.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Quietly confirming that she was still cold, our host allowed us access to the auxiliary blankets cabinet. NB: cabinet doesn't do it justice as it actually occupied the entire wall of our living / dining / bedroom. This feature would have been the envy of any hotel's linen store. Once Blankets No.3 and No.4 were added and I had burrowed inside this weighty cocoon to lend additional body warmth she was finally stable enough to drift off. Quite a relief, I've never seen someone under so many layers, remain so stubbornly cold.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">On our trek there were spider's webs everywhere and very big spiders to patrol them. Webs that spanned meters of space and some weaved so dense that they comprised more Gossamer than air. Basically, a terrifying time for a critter watcher-outer. Indeed I was careful to maneuver myself to the back of the group when single filling down some infested gauntlets. In a sinister break from what i'm used to, these exjotic species group their webs and hang out together, literally. I managed to squeeze 12 individual arachnids into one camera shot. Could they actually be hunting / trap laying as a team? Is there even a collective term for spiders? A pack, a herd, a shoal?</span><span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;"> I doubt it. Consequently I here by coin a new collective term: A Disaster of Spiders. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Update: Trek over and I'm back on WIFI, fact checking. I was too quick to assume. There is a collective term. A group spiders is a cluster or a clutter. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">I would now like to take the opportunity to give a shout out to my brilliant girlfriend who completed this trek whilst riddled with ailments. Blisters engulfed toes on both feet, a nasty knee graze made leg bending painful and last but least least, she endured a four day parasite which meant she hardly ate. And all this during three days of 30 degree heat, below freezing cold and very primitive living conditions. She uttered no complaints, just quietly pushed on with a grace only Grace could muster. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">By the end of the trip our clever little iPhones told us that we had each taken >100,000 steps. It's a funny thing. Had you told me before we left that I would have to put one foot in front of the other that many times, I may have taken the bus instead. Joking. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Or am I? </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Our final Myanmar destination was the miniature sea that is Inle Lake, where several traditional fishing communities live in villages suspended on stilts. The amphibious population relies entirely on boats to get everywhere. We stayed for five days and this, our final proper destination in Asia, didn't disappoint. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">On Christmas eve the hostel put on a several course festive dinner for the 40 of so guests. After a few less traditional starters we were served what I assume was baby turkey (possibly chicken), gravy and all the trimmings (three potatoes). But the highlight of the night was a surprise visit from a local orphanage choir who had been secretly booked to come and sing us Christmas carols. Most of these children didn't appear to speak English so it was particularly touching that they had learnt all of Jesus' biggest birthday belters in a foreign language. Needless to say every one opened their hearts and there purses. There were even some tears amongst the backpackers. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Like everyone else I was moved, however I also had mixed feelings. We had read some awful things about orphanages in the region. For example, >70% of the kids have parents who are still alive. Unwanted children are sometimes sold to orphanages and exploited; forced into manual labour and worse. It's not uncommon for orphanages to pocket generous donations, whilst the children see little benefit. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Like many people, I love being on the water. In another life, one without a moral compass, I would have joined the Royal Navy. So our hostel's 'Full Day No Bulls**t Boat Tour' was a must. That's right, they used a naughty word to advertise a boat trip. Brillo. #hosteliving. #hashtagsactuallymakemecringe. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Christmas day. We woke early with excitement that morning (Christmassy). We all wrapped ourselves up in blankets because it was cold (Christmassy). We donned Christmas hats because it was Christmas day (Christmassy) and then we got into two boats in the pitch black with a couple of Buddhists to go and watch traditional Burmese fisherman on a lake in Asia (not so Christmassy). </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">I was sitting right behind Grace for the duration. Her blanket covered shoulders and little Christmas hat with a backdrop of morning mist, still lake water and mountains was quite a picture. A picture that I took several pictures of. This was the strangest Christmas morning of my life and I've had my fair share of strange Christmas mornings let me tell you; </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Hertfordshire 1996, Hertfordshire 1997. The list goes on.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Hertfordshire 1998 for example. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Seriously though I've never felt such magic. Gliding through the stillness of this massive lake in a little boat at 6am with endless mist and lilies floating past. Visibility was down to maybe 10m at times and then out of the gloom the famous balancing fisherman of Inle would appear, seemingly defying gravity with their ancient skills. The sky evolved beautifully from pitch black until the sun finally crested the nearby peaks and hit us in the face like a welcome wall of warmth. Quite an experience. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">These aforementioned stilt villages make Venice look like the Atacama Desert on a particularly arid day. Cruising through the aquatic streets is reminiscent of the 1990s blockbuster Waterworld, where the star of the show, Kevin Costner (me), goes on a nice festive boat trip. The end. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Something like that. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Just kidding guys. The film portrays a time when global warming has caused the flooding of entire continents and the survivors compete for limited resources. That boat trip did indeed feel like a glimpse into a possible future for some low lying parts of the world. Let's hope it doesn't come to that. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Riding in the back of an Asian Tuk Tuk it's easy to feel like a bumbling Boris Johnson type, a massive whitey Brit sticking out like a sore thumb, chronically out of depth in some foreign land. Perched on a cushioned throne, protected by a fancy canopy and raised above the millions of local moped riders. On </span><span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">the Inle Lake narrow boats, you also feel very on show. Each vessel contains a column of five wooden deck chairs that wouldn't look out of place in a Chelsea garden. It's comical witnessing a line of awkward looking caucasians flying past on their garden furniture at 30mph. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">No one gets a hair cut on holiday so you know you're really traveling when you visit the local barbers. What I took away from the experience is that SE Asians can't get enough of massaging. They love it. Urban centers throughout the region do massage parlors like Harringey does betting shops. I've even seen what must have been pop-up massage stations (garden chairs under gazebos) where weary travelers can pull over to be groped at.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">My haircut included before and after hair washes and surprise surprise, on both occasions each girl chucked in a free head massage. The cheek! Give them the opportunity and Asian people will massage you. One evening, around a campfire in a rural village I witnessed a young lad with his hand between a buffalo calf's legs, massaging its balls. These people just can't help themselves. I scanned the faces of his family members, trying to make eye contact with someone equally as incredulous, however to no avail. So as it happens our guide later explained that this is how you domesticate a young buffalo. Showing it who's boss essentially. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Oh and if you're wondering how much my hair cut, two hair washes / massages, hair dry and product was...</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">A budget busting £2.70! </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Our last activity in Asia was a trip to Shan State's very own hilltop winery, where we treated ourselves to a wine tasting and continental cheese board against a beautiful backdrop of rolling vineyards. Our first proper taste of England (i.e France) for months. This most European of experiences provided a confusing finale to our three months on a continent worlds away from Europe. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">So what will I miss about this continent I hear you ask. This sounds bad, but maybe I won't miss temples...</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">There are a ridiculous number of temples in SE Asia and I feel like I've seen several people's fair share. Don't get me wrong, I've got nothing against people spending their leisure time worshipping a man who, during his time on earth said do not worship me. It's just that they are all quite samey. Or as they say in Asia 'same same but different'. Everywhere you go the big fancy temple is heralded as the region's No.1 tourist attraction. Like it's the only one on the continent.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Plus, many of them have excruciatingly tacky interiors. The gold painted seated Buddha statues are often lit by cheap LED lighting in ghastly colour combinations. It's weird. 'Yeah that's definitely how he would have wanted to be immortalised, as an androgynous, golden, podgy couch potato with a halo of sex shop lighting'. In Cambodia one of our hostels even offered the 'No Temples on this Tour Tour'. That's how much of a problem temples are within the backpacker community. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Facetiousness aside, I will miss the people the most. In every country we felt so very welcome and there was a gentleness that seemed to posses everyone we interacted with. Ok, nearly everyone. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Oh and of course the crazy low prices for almost everything. I will miss them until the day I die. I will miss the people for a few more years perhaps. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Thank you so much for tuning in everyone. Today's offering has taken a bit longer to publish, which I'm attributing to massive American culture shock. Today marks the beginning of South American leg Week 4. Yikes time is flying by. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Adios. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">xxx</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">P.s look out for one of my anecdotes soon to be published on: www.southeastasiabackpacker.com</span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02230653032218435418noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1860489323817685614.post-88187004217412438392017-12-30T01:02:00.000-08:002018-05-29T05:58:27.699-07:00Part V - Vietnam 2, Laos and Chiang Mai <div style="color: #454545; font-family: '.SF UI Text'; font-size: 17px; line-height: normal;">
<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Our next stop was Ninh Bin; gateway to another UNESCO site of outstanding natural ruddy gorgeousness. Massive towers of rock with sheer faces rise out of mangrove for miles around; Limestone Karst formations if you're asking (you weren't). The best way to experience this landscape is a three hour rowing boat trip with one of the many local women waiting on the river bank. Our tiny engine looked well into her 60s which is incredible considering how far she propelled five adults.</span><span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;"> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">We spent the afternoon gliding quietly through shallow, crystal clear waters in the shadow of (and beneath) these monstrously magnificent rock formations. One reason why you aren't allowed to row your own boat is the many grottos you pass through. The knowledge and skill required to navigate them is impressive. It's amazing approaching the narrow slivers of black, separating the water from the spiky limestone above. You can't quite believe you're going to fit in and sure enough we spend most of the time with our heads flattened to the boat dodging stalactites and grazing the damp walls as our elderly companion shrieks useless Vietnamese instructions, all the while with an hysterical grin on her face. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Thought of the Day: </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">I thought I was polite in England. Out here my politeness is off the scale. It's ridiculous. I'm often falling over myself desperate to ingratiate myself to the locals. 'Thank you thank you thank you', with a smile so wide my ears grimace. I imagine it's that I just want to be a good ambassador for the UK. What worries me is that, here in former French Indochina, I don't even need to be an imperialist apologist. So what will I be like in Myanmar, a former British colony...? The inherited guilt factor might result in a go-nuclear smile that could rip my face in half, much like it did in the 80s for Zippy of Rainbow fame. It doesn't Bungle the bear thinking about. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Anyway, some of these tunnels are >250m long and the few lights strung up along their length cast the interior in a spooky hue, made more magical by the rhythmic echoes of her oars gently pressing through the oily black water; the only audible sound. We were then treated to breathtaking juxtapositions at each tunnel exit. The gloomy claustrophobia of these subterranean rivers, where the weight of ten thousand tons just inches above is palpable makes the squinting brightness and neck straining landscape of the mountainous lagoons even more impressive. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Translation of the day:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">'Please do not flush toilet paper or sanitary napkins in the toilet bowl'. Personally I would follow this up with 'Hey Vietnam, if you are going to recycle paper towel products, please use them as napkins first, sanitary towels second, not vice versa. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Yours sanitarily, </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Department of Sanitation & Napkins'. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Update: Grace has just informed me that many older signs in England also use the term 'sanitary napkins'. It still sounds odd to me. I'm leaving it in. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">We also scootered the 50km from Ninh Binh to the oldest National Park in Vietnam. A hilly climb through dense jungle brought us to a 1,000 year old tree which really was impressively girthy. I reckon approximately 1,000 rings in cross section. It made me look so small, can you believe? </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">I've actually become a bit obsessed with Asian trees. They are so much bigger than their temperate European cousins and come in some really interesting shapes. Forget uniform simple cylinders, my favourites have trunks like 5m diameter Starfruits in cross section. They are also usually decorated in helical vines, which snake up the trunks and through the forest like massive unbiblical cords connecting something with I don't know what. Come to think of it, what is vine? What does vine connect to and what is vine's purpose? I've never witnessed vine's end. Perhaps there reside a crock 'o' gold. I guess we'll never know. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">As with National Parks the world over, base camp really gets your hopes up with massive posters exhibiting all the parks' sexiest beasts. The country's most awesome mammals, reptiles and birds which you will definitely never ever see no matter how long you spend there. I wager even this park's guides have never witnessed its Leopards, Civets or Pangolins. What's the point in protecting them if no one ever sees them? Here's an idea, why not round them all up, put them in small cages and bring them to the city so we can all see. No Oliver! That's what they want you to think. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">The highlight of the park was the Primate Rescue Centre and the Tortoise Rescue Centre. Unsurprisingly these magnificent animals are hunted to near extinction in SE Asia. Their various body parts selling for thousands of dollars a piece. For instance, we met six of the last remaining 65 Golden Headed Langurs in the entire world. According to our guide, one particularly cruel and gruesome ritual still practiced in parts of China and Vietnam involves a sedated monkey and a round table with a small hole in the middle. The animal is placed under said table, it's cranium partially exposed through the hole. It is then scalped and the brains are spooned directly from the head. This beyond fresh, beyond belief culinary experience is supposed to make the diner more intelligent. Or, exacerbate their psychosis perhaps? </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">The park was also home to a Prehistoric Man Cave. Unfortunately this ancient den did not, as suggested, contain an 8,000 year old plasma screen and Sony PlayStation. It was in fact empty, except for a family of Vitamin D deficient crickets. At first I was confused when studying the map. There was no prehistoric womans' cave plotted. However, I then remembered that women hadn't been invented till a few hundreds years later, when a British chap called Adam ate a rack of ribs which caused him to excrete, amongst other things, a different type of man called Eva, from Germany. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">I think. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Something like that. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Traveling through north Vietnam by bus, the booming economy is clearly evident, most impressively, the massive investment in infrastructure. It made me think about the big cities we've passed through recently and how their economies are predominantly manufacturing based. The millions of tons of plastic tat sold in thousands of Asian markets annually. And where this crap will all inevitably end up, in the ground or in the oceans. Just one of the numerous ways in which homoerectus is leaving its filthy size 7 billion carbon boot print on nearly every landscape this Earth has offered us. As Agent Smith so eloquently put it in 1999's blockbuster The Matrix, 'You move to another area, and you multiply, and you multiply, until every natural resource is consumed. The only way you can survive is to spread to another area. There is another organism on this planet that follows the same pattern. Do you know what it is? A virus. Human beings are a disease, a cancer of this planet'. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Mic drop? No? Ok. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Did you know, as a result of the widespread agriculturalisation (not a word) and industrialisation (a word) of the planet, our natural environment has been so irrevocably affected by humans that Earth has left the post-glacial Holocene epoch (most recent geological time period) and we are now living in the recently coined 'Anthropocene' time period. An alien geologist landing on Earth in the distant future will find the fossilised underground infrastructure (tunnels and foundations) of our drowned cities and all sorts of weird and wonderful rock types, infected with man-made pollutants; the melted down and resolidifed residue of mankind's relatively short lived tenure. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">This leads me on to a new, yet completely irrelevant feature: Donald's Trump of The Week. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">That's right, completely unrelated to our trip. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Olly shrugs, 'bite me'.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">So this week's mouth fart sees Donald turn his attention to the natural environment, not for the first time of course. He's gone and reduced the size of two National Parks by 84% and 50% in a massively controversial move he labeled 'uncontroversial'. Classic Trump. Effectively he's eradicated millions of hectares of Native American land. Yet another almost unprecedented presidential policy the like of which hasn't been seen for 50 years. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Moving on to Cat Ba Island we found a wonderful backpacker haven. We assumed Halong Bay's world famous UNESCO protected landscape would be the highlight of the region but we hardly bothered leaving our hostel. A reliable source had recommended Woodstock Beach Camp and they were spot on. Essentially a huge wooden hut with a private beach where the many pets and hammocks roam free. Our days and nights quickly filled up; camp fires, games, family dinners and a kitten petting zoo. We made some Dutch friends and really settled into island life. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">I've never felt so British as the first day at Woodstock when Grace and I were getting ready for dinner. Timon, our Dutch dorm mate, had just reeled off the symptoms of his dicky tummy before returning to the en suite for the umpteenth time. There was an awkward 20 second silence before Grace had the genius idea of playing some music on her phone to drown out the sounds a mortified Timon would inevitably begin emitting at any moment. Incredibly, just 30 seconds into the tune 'who is this?' echoed out from the toilet. At first I just ignored it, assuming he was on the phone. However, the question was then repeated, personalised and followed up with 'it's awesome'. And so it dawned on me. I was about to have a conversation with a freak, a truly continental European. A man who knows nothing of the phrase 'I just wanted the earth to open and swallow me up'. As both Timon and the conversation continued to flow we had to stifle our giggles. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">One evening a bunch of local men showed up at the our very western hostel bar. For the next hour a faux fun / uneasy atmosphere held the venue hostage as the inebriated group flirted with the female staff, who forced painted on smiles. They stayed for one round then headed off. It was then that barman Temo gave us the low down. Every so often these off duty cops show up and drink for free. They play the expat staff by offering massive tips, then taking them back, then offering them again. On the surface and from a distance it could be misconstrued as harmless fun but it's actually a darker power game forced upon the hosts by a bent police force wielding little actual power. Woodstock's owner is a well connected Vietnamese land owner known to the local authorities as a guy who brings in a lot of foreign money via his lucrative hostel. The frustrated local police don't like Woodstock's multicultural, uber chilled ethos so they do what they can; steal a few drinks. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">SE Asian Fruit Watch:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">a) The Dragonfruit's stunningly exotic appearance is writing cheques its bland mush interior can't cash. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">b) The Duran looks like a coconut that has had a horrific allergic reaction and smells like a tupaware of perishable packed lunch left out in the sun for a few days. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">c) The apparently innocent banana is nothing short of a pandemic in SE Asia. It has permeated every corner of society and arrives on pretty much every breakfast plate with an air of misplaced arrogance. How can a fruit which, more than any other is so frequently rotten under the skin, be so popular!? </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">d) Starfruit. Star of the show by name. Third fruit from the left by every other measure. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">For posterity mainly I feel it necessary to mention that we did of course take a boat trip through Halong Bay; the single reason why tourists visit this region. In the event, the overcast, almost cold conditions did sour the experience somewhat. That said, the landscape was indeed stunning, the floating village was romantic and the steep spikey rock climb to Monkey Island's summit in flip flops* was an unexpected achievement we were both genuinely proud of, receiving verbal back pats from several fellow climbers. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">*did no read the small print. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Thought of the Day: In each country so far, non wedding day wedding photos have been a frequent sight. At every landmark we visit, there's a photo shoot going on, complete with professional lighting. In Cambodia there was even a guy burning kindling upwind to create a pop star smoke effect in shot downwind. On our Ninh Binh boat trip we rounded a corner and found a bride and groom struggling to remain standing on a very narrow and wobbly rowing boat whilst the photographer and his entourage tried to remain afloat on another equally unsteady boat. So I've just woken up from an accidental nap on Woodstock's beach and surprise surprise there's a pair at it again. It's become quite comical how these situations keep cropping up in unexpected places. Today's bride and groom are wearing a floor length dress and suit respectively, no surprises there. But why are they posing in knee deep water? For that classic Vietnamese amphibious legs vibe that symbolises a long and happy marriage? </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">We crossed into a misty mountainous Laos without incident and headed for Luang Prabang, finally reaching this beautiful town a fun filled 27hrs after leaving Hanoi. Disembarking for the final time, the sense of relief was off the chart. I even found myself sincerely thanking the coach crew, the very men who had presided over my torture.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">It's hard not to be enamored with Luang Prabang. It's beautiful French architecture houses numerous tastefully decorated cafes and restaurants and the intricately painted golden temples are standardly stunning. The issue is, in recent years LP has been diagnosed with a chronic case of UNESCO syndrome. Ironically, by bringing the town under its protective umbrella, UNESCO classification has seen tourism explode and as per usual, not in a good way. The now exorbitant property prices have left ordinary Prabangers out in the cold. The reason why every eatery looks so inviting is because it has been taken over by a wealthy western expat who knows exactly what the middle class tourists want to see. In the words of one journalist, 'Luang Prabang has lost its soul'. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Translation of the Day:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">More toilet signage I'm afraid. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">'Please do not throw tissues', (fine) 'sanitary towels', (fine) 'stockings', (bit weird) 'or any other debris in toilet'. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Ok so this particular toilet has had such a problem in the past with people flushing their unwanted socks down it, that the authorities have considered 'other debris' too vague a category and have instead specifically named socks as a top three blockage item. Given the time of year, it could alternatively be a festive themed sign. Which begs the question, do the handful of Christians that live in Laos traditionally open their Christmas stockings in public toilets? </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Find out next time on InternationalRescue1718. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">In Prabang we hired our poshest ride yet, a Honda Scoopy. Up to this point I had always regarded Scoopy owners with envy, from behind the handlebars of our several Honda Waves; the poor man's Scoopy. I was pleased to find our upgrade didn't disappoint. She sported beautiful plus size model curves and purred like hostel kittens past. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">This gorgeous ride delivered us to the most incredible waterfalls I have ever seen. And I've seen upwards of four.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">I've seen five. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">For hundreds of horizontal meters, water cascades over rounded terraces of beige limestone. This rock type is particularly soluble, giving the water an invitingly milky opaque turquoise appearance. Even stubbing my toe on a submerged boulder couldn't dent my enjoyment of that most heavenly of swims. Needless to say we got a bit snap happy with the cameras. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Right about now you may be thinking, 'hmm Olly's blog posts usually wrap up right about now. He's covered geology, he's shoe-horned in some irrelevant trivia, he's written the odd joke, what more is there?' Well I'm afraid to say folks, it's a Christmas special, so today's yarn is a smidgen longer. Plus I haven't referred to a war yet: </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Of course, with my background, no discussion on Laos would be complete without mentioning the fact that this country holds the unfortunate accolade of most bombed country on the planet per capita. During the Vietnam War (final box ticked) the US attacked Vietnamese supply lines through Laos, on an unprecedented scale. The total tonnage of bombs dropped works out as one B-52 bomb load (30 ish tonnes!) every eight minutes for nine years straight...</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Today, some 80 million items which failed to function as designed litter Laos's countryside. The vast majority are cluster munitions; fragile fist sized explosives that if mishandled can detonate with horrific consequences. Tragically, this deadly legacy has killed >20,000 Lao civilians since the end of the war. #criminalUSA. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Thought of the Day:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">One of my favourite deserts - cheesecake - is translated quite literally in SE Asia. On two occasions now we have been presented with a square of sponge à la disappointment, simply topped with grated cheese. Weird. I don't know whether they are just pandering to what they consider to be strange western tastes or they have actually adopted this bipolar treat as their own, having not bothered to check the recipe first. I'm surprised they don't just serve up two slabs of cheddar sandwiching a layer of jam. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Hang on, Mental Note: sandwich jam between cheddar when you get back to England. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Yours sanitarily</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Oliver. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">From LP we took the two day slow boat to one of Thailand's land border crossings. Essentially 18 hours of slaloming the epically wide Mekong River at speeds in excess of no miles an hour. The landscape remained hilly jungle throughout and the riverbed was unusually uneven, being littered with huge bus sized chunks of rock towering out of the water. Their oblique angled sedimentary bedding (geology grad for life) and shiny silvery surface suggested a passage of travel from the heavens, giving them an unworldly, meteoric appearance.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">At the mid-point, the boat docked and we were then required to find accommodation for night. Not hard as the hotel salesmen and saleswomen are already waiting on the river bank, ready to swoop in for the accommodating kill. Our salesperson turned out to be a </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">nine year old girl with a ring binder containing photos depicting suspiciously luxurious hotel rooms. Without a hint of sarcasm our Scottish friend Caid shouted to another friend, 'we're going to go with this lady'. That made me smile. I mean SE Asian women are generally quite small but come on. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Having crossed the border and attached ourselves to three 20 somethings from our boat we were immediately stranded, with no taxis willing or big enough to drive us to Chiang Mai at that late hour. Eventually one local man (not even a taxi driver) agreed to take us. With four of us squeezed into the back three seats, we embarked on a terrifying roller coaster ride. Our retired F1 driver completed the trip in a face melting two hours, with Google Maps calculating the drive at nearly double that. 'Don't tell my parents guys' Olly cried. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">In Chiang Mai Grace and I ticked off a traveling biggy; a day in the life of a rescued Elephant. As in we spent the day with rescued elephants, not dressed up as them. Having done our homework we knew to pick an ethical rescue centre - Happy Elephants. Back in 2005 I had spent some time close to African elephants whilst working on a game reserve, however I had never popped on my swimming cozy and actually frolicked in a river with a group of these amazing creatures, including a baby. That was a real (surreal) highlight. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Throughout the day we fed our group of four giants hundreds of bananas and sugar canes. There was a scary moment when the bright yellow banana sized float attached to my waterproof GoPro camera nearly got snatched out of my hands by an inquisitive and powerful trunk. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Unbeknown to me, Elephant dung has a few applications. Happy Elephants actually sell dung in a number of gift forms; bookmarks, statuettes, etc. The rescue centre that is, not friendly entrepreneurial elephants. I can't say I wasn't tempted to make a purchase; 'Thanks for the present Olly, it's shit'.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Congratulations reader, you have endured the entire Christmas Special. As a token of my appreciation, please find attached a BUPA voucher for 36 Franks, to be redeemed at all participating branches of Woolworths. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Good luck. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Have a Christmas (belated) and a New Year. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Lots of love,</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Oliver</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">xxx</span></div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02230653032218435418noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1860489323817685614.post-10753906272152756372017-12-08T03:56:00.002-08:002018-05-29T05:59:57.092-07:00Part IV - Vietnam <div style="color: #454545; font-family: '.SF UI Text'; font-size: 17px; line-height: normal;">
<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">We tackled the Vietnam border, crossing without incident. Apparently spending too much time filling in the very detailed medical form, it was snatched away from us prematurely by a charming Vietnamese border guard, who barked something incomprehensible and demanded four more dollars. Safe in the knowledge that our health was the state's highest priority, we got onto a bus and headed for Ho Chi Minh City (HCMC) AKA Saigon. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">In HCMC we used a dodgy looking backstreet travel agent to change some money. Behind and above the woman serving me was a curious sight. Three CCTV cameras, all angled the same way, recording her every move. Clearly you can't be too careful here. However, what I really enjoyed was the fourth camera. Positioned just 50cm to the left, it was pointed at the other three. Ok so the manager is worried that three individual cameras might collude with each other, and the clerk? Brilliant. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">One of the most popular attractions in HCMC is the War Remnants Museum, which until recently was the Museum of American and Chinese War Crimes. Crikey. So as you can imagine, they don't pull many punches therein. And fair enough, the USA's involvement was without doubt the worst military intervention of the second half of the 20th Century, in terms of material destruction, casualties, war crimes, illegality, chemical weapons usage and unexploded weapons legacy. So in all 'terms' then.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">The last four presidents, as well as the beady-eyed, toupe-topped incumbent have all visited Vietnam during their time in office as a mark of respect for the atrocities wrought on this land by their predecessors. This is the official line. What they probably wouldn't admit is that, since the war, the USA has used its global dominance to first ruin Vietnam's economy, then offer it a capitalist olive branch. In the last few decades, they have molded Vietnam into a sycophantic export market and, more importantly, a key military ally / lapdog neighbouring their mighty nemesis China. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">If anyone reading this is interested in how awful the USA was during the Cold War, I implore you to read this illuminating and shocking article: </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">https://amp.theguardian.com/news/2015/apr/22/vietnam-40-years-on-how-communist-victory-gave-way-to-capitalist-corruption</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Thought of the Day: </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Little old Oliver Brown is above average height in Vietnam. This is huge news. Literally. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">How does this make me feel? Good question Oliver. Boring answer though I'm afraid - indifferent. Surely I should feel more confident, more important, more able to reach things, more able to answer the question 'how's the weather up there?' </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">On our first morning in HCMC we bagged up several kilograms of laundry and were told we could pick them up the next afternoon. Only later did I realise that this left me with just two clean tops for tomorrow's trip to the War Remnants Museum, where the two main exhibitions are the 1940s / 1950s armed struggle against French colonial rule and of course the Vietnam War, or as its known here, the American War of Aggression. This would have been fine had the two tops in question not been my 'PARIS' stenciled on the back t-shirt and Woody's* Stars & Stripes flag vest. Awkward. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Luckily our newly clean clothes were actually ready by the morning. Bullet dodged. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">*sorry pal, I've had it for years I know. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Sadly the Vietnamese love Donald Trump. Our Chu Chi Tunnels tour guide, realising some yanks were aboard the coach, took the opportunity to praise the unlikely leader of the free world. This gesture received a pretty luke warm to ice cold response. Later on when he proclaimed that Vietnam is now 'a peaceful country with no hate' I felt compelled to shout out 'Trump hates' which I did... to yet more luke warmth. Fickle crowd, tough crowd. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">I imagine most of what they hear via state media is that he stands up to China (which they love). I wonder if they hear much about his retweeting far right propaganda, sexually assaulting women, etc etc. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">So far in Vietnam we have heard Westlife's Greatest Hits played in three separate restaurants. I've noticed this previously when abroad; western pop music travels very slowly around the globe. I wonder if they even know that Westlife split up in 2012. I should really say something. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">I love this example in particular because the album in question was the soundtrack to a rather homoerotic holiday in Majorca with my, at the time, newly single pal Nick Fishbourne. For five nights during the summer of love (August 2014) we drank our way through the all inclusive bar and cheered each other up by serenading one another with back to back Irish pop classics on our grotty hotel balcony. Ahh those were the days. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Update: three separates restaurants and a coffee shop. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Back to the tunnels. Grace led the charge of 20 odd tourists along a 140m stretch of a very narrow and claustrophobic Vietcong tunnel. We emerged pouring with sweat and with grazed shoulders. I hate to think what it would have been like living and fighting down there year after year. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Thought of the Day: Brash obnoxious Americans*. They can hardly contain themselves can they. Even when confronted with an iconically tragic and poignant location such as Chu Chi, the area of south Vietnam that came to opitimise the brutal close quarters combat of this conflict. For me it was a somber place. Why is it that some people can't just shut up for an afternoon and demonstrate some quiet reverence for the hundreds of their countrymen who perished, right here, in the most horrific ways imaginable. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">*a generalisation sure, of course many yanks are more measured. Maybe it's just a coincidence that those that I've interacted with in the last two months are very much the 'WE'RE HERE AND EVERYONE NEEDS TO KNOW THAT' type of insufferable American. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">I would like to take this opportunity to say how brilliant a travel companion my travel companion is. Grace the backpacker is logical, pragmatic, adventurous, relentlessly positive and most importantly, fun. I'm absolutely over the sun and the moon that she has entrusted me with the position of co-pilot, activity assistant, entertainer and all round adventure partner on this trip of a lifetime. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Chu Chi was also home to a shooting range, operated by the Army. You could argue that firing a gun for 'sport' is in bad taste considering the range occupies a former battlefield. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Having read about the pure hell that is modern warfare I wanted to at least experience one realistic aspect of what millions of poor souls have experienced before me. After all, had I been born in the 1890s there's a scary high chance I would have died in the trenches of northern Europe as a volunteer or conscripted soldier. I also put forward indulging my primitive caveman hunting instinct to Grace as further justification. To be honest, a bit of a weak argument. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Earlier in the day a big group of male tourists had clambered onto a relic US tank, immobilised by a Vietcong mine in 1967. With the same gun-ho grin spread across all their faces they cheered and posed for endless cameras, glorifying a spot where someone likely died. We both found this weird. So I shot them...</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">a disdainful stare. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">For me there was a difference between that behavior and my first ever gun experience. Mine had been sobering. It left me feeling reflective, not cheerful. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">In the event there was nothing that remarkable about the experience. It's almost disconcertingly familiar; blame childhood computer games. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Having said that, one thing you're not prepared for is the volume. If you pay to shoot you are provided with ear protection, however when queuing 10m away, the unexpected reports of several rifles are both ear splitting and unnerving. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Hot countries are bad news for the humble foot, with flips flops offering as much protection as a particularly adept conscientious objector. My pair currently look like they've been dragged through a bush backwards, briefly chewed by a ravenous otter and then pushed back through a bush, forwards. Several of my little mozzy bites from the early days have joined up to form a conurbation occupying acres of ground; a scabby moonscape born out of the frustratingly inevitable itch then scratch to broken skin combo. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">In addition, recently whilst in flip flops, I strolled through some cleverly hidden barbed wire on the way to a cave. That was a sore point, Olly quipped. Furthermore, my left sandal has rubbed-to-raw nearly every point of contact with that foot, to the amusement of my right foot which has since poked plenty of fun at its unfortunate neighbour. Thankfully, a timely dose of karma played out whence one of my right foot's toe nails inexplicably went black and subsequently fell off. 'Who's the Scabby Scarlet now?!' screeched Lefty with gleeful vengeance. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">The Independence Palace in HCMC was a surprising highlight. This Vietnamese former equivalent to the White House, felt like being in a 1960s pilot episode of MTV's Cribs, with our audio tour narrator describing how pimped out the president's former gaff was. Games room, cinema, heli-pad, torture room, hidden staircase to the underground bunker, etc. Ok there was no torture room. We've heard a lot about torture during our various museum trips. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">I can also now say I've been in a presidents' bedroom. Is that something worth saying? Only time will tell. Useful small talk for meeting a president I imagine. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">We had read pretty damning reviews of Nah Trang, however our favoured next stop - Hoi An - was too long a bus ride. We arrived in Nah Trang with the sun rising over the sea which was nice. The niceties ended there. Vieing to become Russia's Costa Del Sol, the beach strip is a mass of concrete and steel reaching up to a wasted sun. Due to bus timings we had to spend two days on the beach, which of course is not the end of the world, however our time is precious and Nah Trang has about as much culture as the Howard Centre multistory car park in Welwyn Garden City. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Grace ordered a Banh Mi, the Vietnamese / French classic, from a street food vendor. Watching the man prepare it on the back of his miniaturized motorised mobile kitchen, he first added chicken, then egg to an oiled pan. I was about to shout 'which came first' but thankfully managed to bite my tongue. He had already misunderstood the English for 'one', having begun preparing two baguettes so it was unlikely I would get a chuckle out of him. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">We swooped into Hoi An like a couple of starving culture vultures, excited to be visiting Nha Trang's polar opposite. The Old Town is a very pretty UNESCO World Heritage site. Vietnam's best kept example of a pre-colonial fishing port, with plentiful Japanese and Chinese architectural influence. By night, numerous strings of colorful Chinese lanterns light up every street. A rich man's bunting. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">We spent the day visiting museums, pagodas, markets, bridges and an 18th Century Phung House. Having no idea what a Phung House was, I assumed it must be the Vietnamese equivalent to Pat Sharp's Fun House. To Grace's joy (souring hastily to irritation) I spent the rest of the day singing the theme tune; 'Phung House, all that phung, prizes to be wung'. In the event, the house wasn't even that phun. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">I just deleted a whole section on the adverse weather conditions we experienced in Hoi An. a) it was too Negative Nigel, b) it was all rain based material, too British, c) you have all experienced a seriously heavy deluge before so you get it and d) having felt very sorry for my and Grace's selves I then did some homework and realised central Vietnam has a three month monsoon season and just two weeks ago Hoi An was flooded to over my head height. So I should count ourselves lucky we didn't have to swim around the Phung House. Actually that does sound quite phun. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Ironically, the chunk of rainy rambling I retired to the trash can came in at a similar word count to the paragraph above. Hmm. Which means they cancel each other out and I should exclude then both right? Wrong. Quantity not quality. That's my mantra. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">All I'll say is that the rain was so bad and the forecast so equally dire that we modified our plans and took the very unusual step of paying for the most luxurious of backpacker luxury items - plane tickets. Goodbye soggy Hoi An, hello cold Hanoi. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Critter Watch: </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">None this week. I don't like to critisise but one criticism of our Vietnam experience would be that our frequency of interactions with critters has plunged to critical levels. Maybe critters are critically endangered here, leaving me little critterial to write about. Instead, all I can do is write this critique and hope for a critterfull future. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Thought of the Day: when I'm down in the dumps about something and looking for someone, something (can I blame inanimate objects?) to blame for our misfortunes, Grace is usually positive in face of it. Yesterday she told me about a Buddhist parable called The Second Arrow. NB: I think my Buddhist in training pal Woody may have already explained this to me years ago, in a previous life; a reincarnated Goldfish perhaps? Famously forgetful fish. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">In summary, one can't control the suffering inflicted upon them (the first arrow) but they can the second arrow; the additional suffering we all naturally inflict upon ourselves by choosing anger, frustration, sadness, etc. Learn to accept that what's done is done and move on asap. Woody is the embodiment of this mind trick*. I've seen him brush off some mega material losses in the past. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">*come to think of it, this is probably a sentence best reserved for the big guy in the Nirvana sky himself, Mr Buddha. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Grace has drawn my attention to the modern day digital era embarrassment that is the Instagram Boyfriend. These photoshoots can go on indefinitely as the submissive male struggles to nail the perfect shot that will presumably elevate the female to celebrity status (amongst her friends). After each cheesy catalogue pose, the dominant female will retrieve her phone, likely berate her not so professional photographer for his lack of professional photographer skills, before the process is repeated. We've witnessed these extraordinary (courting?) rituals on a number of occasions and it never ceases to bemuse. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Hanoi's Old Quarter, where we stayed, was one big market, divided into streets dominated by shops curiously selling the same items. For example, there was stationary street, food street, kitchen utensil street, safe street, and if you're in the market for something a bit more fancy, foreign embassy street. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Our party hostel provided free walking tours. Stop No.3 was an imitation Notre Darm cathedral. Turns out, before the French colonised Indochina, there was a Buddhist temple in this very spot. When the French arrived they demolished it and replaced it with their Catholic version. Way to ingratiate yourself with the locals guys. They definitely won't rebel now. Also, if god does exit and He (She? It?) practices what He/She preaches in the Bible I imagine It wouldn't be happy with anyone destroying anything belonging to anyone else. Especially not a shrine to the Buddha, who by all accounts and I'm sure Jesus would agree, was a swell guy. I can't imagine a bigger blasfamus slap in the face for Vietnam's Buddhists. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">In summary, I don't understand religion. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Thought of the Day: I also don't understand Nixon ordering the indiscriminate bombing of Hanoi in 1968. During WWII the US and UK flattened many German cities and towns. Did it win the war? No, it strengthened the resolve of the population and resulted in the needless deaths of thousands of innocents. How was this lesson not learnt!? Nixon was a right **** though. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Ho Chi Minh, a venerable god in the eyes of the Vietnamese, lies in state in his very own massive Lenin style mausoleum in Hanoi. And what a state he must be in by now, at 127 years old. A morbid curiosity led me to research how we could join the thousands of pilgrims that shuffle past his glass sarcophagus on a daily basis. Unfortunately however every October and November he holidays in sunny Russia, where crucial 'maintenance' is carried out. Presumably some anti-aging cream for those voluptuous wrinkles, an industrial strength face mask, guyliner and some 'Communist Red' lippy.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">We visited the 'Hanoi Hilton', a former French colonial prison (now museum). Like HCMC's War Remnants Museum, the exhibitions here were laced with Vietnamese propaganda. Essentially, the message here was; the French treated our Vietnamese revolutionary heroes terribly during the 50s, however in the early 70s we treated downed US Air Force pilots like royalty, despite their indiscriminate bombing of our city. This latter exhibition is named 'Special Guests'. Of course there is plenty of truth in all this, however these guys know how to lay it on thick. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">There is one brilliant example of the museum's content providers implicating themselves in this regard. Posters detailing the stories of several Americans imprisoned include 'direct quotes'. However these so called direct quotes, which depict prison life as some sort of heaven, are written in broken English, surely proving they've been translated from a foreign language right? Hmm. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Our treat of the day was an exorbitant bottle of beer at Top of Hanoi bar, an outdoor drinkery perched on the roof of Lotte Tower, 272m up (somewhere in between 1 Canary Wharf and the Shard). Old romantic me timed our arrival for sunset and the 360 degree view of this mega city was breathtaking. Unfortunately the pollution from approximately six million mopeds obscures the horizon, creating a mystical fog which hangs in fact quite beautifully between the numerous blocks of flats below. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Experiencing this perspective got me thinking, then reading online, about cities. Fact of the Day: Did you know, the abandoned derelict section of Detroit is actually the size of the entire city of San Francisco! Crazy. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">For three nights we stayed in a dorm room at THE Hanoi party hostel. This was a good and not so good experience. Having to wear clothes when I could be naked is always going to be an irritation, however it's something we must get used to. In our Autumn Budget, we've had to cut expenditure on housing in 2018; our more pricey South American journey leg. Looks like dormitories will become the norm-itories. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">The End</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">(American voiceover):</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Next time on International Rescue:</span></div>
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<li style="color: #454545; font-family: '.SF UI Text'; font-size: 17px; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 12pt;"></span><span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Embarrassment as Olly fails to explain Limestone Karsts to Grace </span></li>
<li style="color: #454545; font-family: '.SF UI Text'; font-size: 17px; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 12pt;"></span><span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Despair as a weather app fails to forecast drizzle </span></li>
<li style="color: #454545; font-family: '.SF UI Text'; font-size: 17px; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 12pt;"></span><span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">And jubilation as Olly fails to predict a sausage.</span></li>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Wow! I know I'll be tuning in.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Thank you for reading. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Donations welcome. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Love. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">xxx</span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02230653032218435418noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1860489323817685614.post-26301901075402884222017-11-22T04:55:00.000-08:002018-04-10T10:06:00.798-07:00Part III - Phnom Penh, Koh Rong, Kampot<div style="color: #454545; font-family: '.SF UI Text'; font-size: 17px; line-height: normal;">
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Phnom Penh was a bit of a shock to the system. Unfortunately there is a seedy side to the city. I won't go into detail but at any one time there is a surprisingly high number of single middle aged caucasian males in town.<br />
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">We were lifted however, by a happy coincidence. It transpired that we had arrived as the biggest festival in the Cambodian calendar was about to kick off. As we sipped frozen Daiquiris on a rooftop bar (treat day), below us, vast crowds stretched for miles along the banks of the enormously wide Mekong River. One of the main events was a Dragonboat tournament involving 400 dragon crews from across the country. These slender vessels are seriously lengthy, each carrying some 50 oarsmen. The event made the annual Oxbridge fixture look like an inebriated water boatman and a rather maladroit nymph going for a lazy afternoon jaunt in a drainage ditch. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">The Water Festival boasted endless market stalls offering a plethora of weird and wonderful food stuffs. I noted a few Phom Penh delicacies and I shall now do my best to describe them in layman's terms: </span></div>
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<li style="font-family: '.SF UI Text'; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Menlo-Regular; font-size: 10pt;"></span><span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Pizza-base-like disc of glued together shrimp. No toppings. Adhesive unknown</span></li>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Last night we had a lock-in at Salty Dog Tattoos, an ink parlor owned by one of Grace's old school friends. Coincidentally, one of the other twenty something expats I got chatting to used to work for Cambodia Daily, the very same recently shut down independent news outlet I mentioned in my last post. As a journalist working in 'a secret dictatorship' George knew his stuff and clearly enjoyed delivering a detailed, if a bit slurred, account of Cambodia's recent history. He also gave me the inside scoop on the incumbent despot, Hun Sen, who recently imprisoned the leader of the opposition and passed a massively controversial law allowing his ruling party to dissolve any opposition party. One last fact: He also happens to be the world's longest ruling Prime Minister. Not a good sign.</span><span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;"> </span><span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;"></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Sadly, what I gleaned is that as the West has little interest in the country, economically or strategically, our media largely doesn't bother with its plight either. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Update: at midday today the Cambodian Supreme Court officially ruled in favor of </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">the government actually dissolving the opposition party, accusing them of plotting to overthrow the government. And yes, the supreme judge is a friend of Hun Sen's. So this court decision has effectively ruled out a democratic vote in the 2018 general election. Just imagine for a minute if Theresa attempted to disband the Labour Party. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Thought of the Day: </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">One of Grace's favourite funnies is literal or simply incorrect translations in foreign menus. 'Fried Species', 'Special Porn', and 'Filed Rice'.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">What are these meals!? </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">I particularly enjoyed the mental image of the latter option. Presented on a bed of old office filing cabinet etc. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Our visit to the Killing Fields was, as expected, a difficult experience however an absolute must. The brutality and inhumanity of the Khmer Rouge regime is incomprehensible. S-21 was the Rouge's answer to the Nazi's Colditz Castle, soon becoming Cambodia's most infamous high security prison. Thousands were tortured and executed here. A former secondary school in the heart of the city, S-21 was turned into a museum within a year of the Vietnamese army's "liberation" of Cambodia and as such it persists as a 1979 time capsule, well insulated from modern Phnom Penn. Ominously, its 1960s brutalist architecture is prophetically prison-esque in appearance; something in the plan-view symmetry, the layout of its four constituent four-storey teaching blocks-cum-prison wings. Such a sinister place. I shall never forget it. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">We left questioning how on earth intelligent people like Pol Pot and his inner circle can become so deluded and lost in their ideological fantasy that they actually think they can turn an entire country upside down and establish an 100% self reliant agriculture-lead utopia, founded on the deaths of 2.5 million of its own. It beggars belief. Pol Pot and his Khmer Rouge brethren were spot on about one thing though, the international community would largely turn a blind eye.<br />
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">The restaurant opposite our hostel is simply named 'Come Here'. Bold, authoritative, instructional, brilliant. And no question mark, the audacity, I love it. Needless to say we went there, ate there and never returned. This most genius of names now portraying more of a desperate plea for patrons. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Not technically a critter but cockerels are everywhere, even in the city centre. Charging around, looking strange and flirting with the local chicks. It struck me that, as a true urbanite, I all too easily forget that the common male chicken can sport some surprisingly exotic plumage. And what on earth is going on above the shoulders? I wouldn't be surprised if there is an old Cambodian myth that describes the day Johnny Cockerel, with his beautiful floor length feather coat, took the forbidden grain from the forbidden grain silo. A divine being appeared and immediately struck him down with a wicked curse. Cockerels would forevermore retain their luxurious velvet smoking jackets but be born with a scarlet red sort of clitoral daysack attachment thing swinging beneath their chins. On top of that they would be given silly jesters hats and ferocious facial complexions. Oh and a lifetime flying ban to boot. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">In my last post I wrote 'Angkor Wat could Koh Rong', with regards to our trip to the beach paradise of Koh Rong. Unfortunately these turned out to be famous last words. </span></div>
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<li style="font-family: '.SF UI Text'; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Menlo-Regular; font-size: 10pt;"></span><span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">The whole village was booked up because of the Water Festival, however one guy offered up a spare room in a hostel closed for refurbishment. The shower wasn't plumbed in, he fleeced us on the price because we were desperate and later on, once drunk, he was quite rude. Even to the point where he aplogised for his behavior the following morning. </span></li>
<li style="font-family: '.SF UI Text'; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Menlo-Regular; font-size: 10pt;"></span><span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Having arrived for our six day beach holiday with no cash we soon discovered that the island has no ATMs and the two restaurants which offer the only means of getting cash out charge a budget busting 10% commission. Sure enough, the web is awash with backpackers warning each other to take all your cash out to the island. Those who know me can imagine this was a particularly bitter pill to swallow. </span></li>
<li style="font-family: '.SF UI Text'; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Menlo-Regular; font-size: 10pt;"></span><span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">We trekked a few hours to a beautiful beach only to find it teeming with miniature stinging jelly fish.</span></li>
<li style="font-family: '.SF UI Text'; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Menlo-Regular; font-size: 10pt;"></span><span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Both Grace and I caught a bug, which wiped out a couple of days.</span></li>
<li style="font-family: '.SF UI Text'; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Menlo-Regular; font-size: 10pt;"></span><span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">An enormous spider checked into our room uninvited. This led to hours of panic, sweating, hunting and then guilt. All on my part I might add, Grace is a grown up. </span></li>
<li style="font-family: '.SF UI Text'; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Menlo-Regular; font-size: 10pt;"></span><span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Grace is the biggest book worm I have ever known and so to wake up one morning and find it inexplicably dead as a dodo was truly heartbreaking.</span></li>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Having said all that, of course we had an amazing time and met some fun people. Literally as we stepped off the ferry a rep invited us to 'the biggest bar crawl in Cambodia'. Being a couple of (former) seasoned Freshers Weekers, we signed up there and then. Richy Rich's* Crawl was complete with free vests, free people drawing on you and free drink spilt all over you at irregular intervals. 'Ooo I'm 18 again' Olly cried, brashly. <br />
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">*Mr Rich looked about 40, however I estimate he was probably close to 28. A gaunt, lanky yank with <50% of his skin left untattooed. I couldn't imagine a time when Richy Rich hadn't been hosting a bar crawl. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">We also went to the Full Moon party; fortunately a more modest affair than Thailand's original Ko Phangan behemoth. Five hours of Techno wouldn't usually be my cup of terrible, intolerable tea, however London's clubs don't have the luxury of an en-suite beach. Plus, pootling around in the tropical shallows at sunrise is magical. The perfect experience for one of romantic disposition. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">The highlight of the week for me had to be our final day. 20 or so backpackers on an eight hour boating odyssey, with the sun braving a ridiculously belated appearance. The snorkeling sites were pristine and once darkness had fallen we apparently had ideal conditions (back to cloudy again) for a bioluminescent plankton swim. Apparently there aren't many places in the world where this phenomena occurs. Diving into the mysterious inky blackness was exciting enough but that immediately paled once we got under water. Every arm swing/ leg kick set off a chain reaction. Literally thousands of tiny fairy lights brightly glowing when disturbed. It was like floating in a Disney inspired corner of the cosmos. Amazing. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Tour rep Nemo encouraged me to dive down for optimum pyrotechnics. That was a disconcerting experience; swimming straight downwards into pitch black 20m deep water. In the moment I was more concerned with head-butting a reef shark than a light show.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Booking our bus to Kampot we didn't expect much from the understated company name, however the Diamond Limousine Express was actually not bad. Saying that, I do feel we were slightly mislead. Waiting at the bus station I was rather excited at the prospect of a jewel encrusted pimped-out stretch limousine. So yes I was disappointed when a clapped out, moth-eaten coach of 1970s vintage pulled up.<br />
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Thought of the Day: </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">I am really enjoying eating out. Since Heathrow we have had one solitary meal in. The other 100 plus lunches or dinners have been prepared to order. I feel like the relentlessly animated Rob Brydon in episode after episode of The Trip, with my dishy dining partner Grace Storm as Steve Coogan. Boy I would love to double date with those two. As in date both men concurrently. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Our first hostel in Kampot was cool but the second one really hit the spot. High Tide is situated upstream, a few kilometers out of town. The bar is literally on the river (raised up on stilts) with our thatched bamboo bedroom adjoining. As a result, one could wake up, open the door, shout a coffee order at French Andy (Frandy) and jump in the river all in one unnecessarily obnoxious move. Needless to say we extended our stay. Twice. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">High Tide is nestled in a stretch of riverside jungle with no other signs of life in view. It's run by a bunch of real life 'dudes', who have an impossibly carefree attitude to life. The bar is home to an equally chilled pet troupe; three dogs, three cats, two geese, two ducks and a pig called Piggy the Pig. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Grace and I have since agreed that our favourite traveling day to date was Tuesday's High Tide group outing to a secret waterfall. At first I thought secret shmecret, it's just another tourist trap complete with ticket kiosk and loud obnoxious tourists. After all, Kampot's so called 'Secret Lake' is clearly mapped on Google. This however was the real deal. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Firstly I got to fulfill an adulthood dream of participating in a motorbike 'ride-out'. Our 10 strong moped convoy off-roaded through some pretty hairy terrain whilst I hummed the Sons of Anarchy theme tune and pretended our Honda Airblade was a Harley Davidson. Once the path became too narrow and rocky we ditched the wheels and headed into the jungle proper. Two and a half hours of scrambling, climbing and swimming then ensued, as we ascended up the steep river, pausing at each mini waterfall/ plunge pool for obligatory backflips. The climax was a beautiful river cascading down the front of a 10m tall chunk of red sandstone. I've never been somewhere that's felt so isolated and wild, or felt like such an intrepid explorer. A rain storm of biblical magnitude saturating everyone to the core only served to heighten the Bear Grylls factor. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">It was an incredible experience, made all the better by the effort in getting there. Miraculously, Lola the hostel Pit Bull was there every step of the way, from riding the petrol tank of Frandy's dirt bike to the summit and back. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Critter Watch: </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Suspected biscuit crumbs in Grace's rucksack result in a night raid by a local ant colony. By the morning thousands of the wee ones were hurriedly maneuvering bag detritus out of the bag and down the path. I'm a bit disappointed that we didn't witness the bag actually walk off to be honest. Why do we lie to our children with dangerously misleading cartoons?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">One aspect of this country I didn't expect was the rather sour Chinese sentiment amongst expats and some seasoned travelers. Yesterday a middle aged Aussie labeled them predatory; casual xenophobia seems pretty rife. To be honest, having learnt so much of Cambodia's suffering these last few weeks it's hard not to get emotionally embroiled when you hear stories about China exploiting Cambodia's natural environment to fuel it's insatiable expansionism*. And how the biggest benefactors are Hun Sen and his deeply corrupt establishment. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Did you know, Hun Sen even has his own private army? A touch paranoid perhaps?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">*yes I know I'm a child of the biggest empire in human history. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Our final night was an early night for an early start, however I shouldn't have bothered. Metres away the bar played endless minimalist Techno till late and someone was banging an African drum ever so slightly out of time for what seemed like hours; pure torture. I imagined myself sitting bolt upright, palms over my ears and screaming in a cartoonish fashion. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Ok guys, it's our final night at High Tide, it's 2.30am and I'm live streaming my thoughts. I usually write my blog posts with hindsight, on bus journeys but this time, it's realtime. I'm the hottest I've ever been and for the last two hours I've been scratching a number of itches on average once every five to ten seconds whilst Grace sleeps, silently, arrogantly immobilised just centimeters away. Completely unaware of my perpetual fidgeting.<br />
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">In a Critter Watch special we are now live from the scene. Earlier I constructed an impenetrable slash very penetrable (critter dependent) mozzy net cocoon around our bed. Mozzies, beetles, roaches and (crucially) arachnids, no. A few determined bitey ants, yes. In this creeping state of delirium I have identified four distinct types of itch: </span></div>
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<li style="font-family: '.SF UI Text'; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Menlo-Regular; font-size: 10pt;"></span><span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Swinging fan air flow tickling my leg hair (a bad time to be covered in a million exterior nerve endings) </span></li>
<li style="font-family: '.SF UI Text'; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Menlo-Regular; font-size: 10pt;"></span><span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Fan causing mozzy net to gently caress feet. Our bed is weirdly short</span></li>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Ok so it's the next day and I have just read back what I wrote last night. I agree, it's a bit weird. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">I'm going to leave it in.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Grace has just taken possession of her replacement credit card. This is splendid news. Having said that I'll have to stop referring to myself as 'Master of Coin', which is a shame. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">I do miss Game of Thrones. What will I do when it ends? Discuss.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Cambodia Summary: </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Lovely people, horrible past, uncertain future. Sadly the current political trajectory has civil unrest written all over it. Although having said that it will probably only take a popular uprising to topple this (excuse my français) nasty piece of work. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Thanks again everyone for tuning in. How is cold old England by the way? (Olly laughs heartily). </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Saying that, we did both admit to missing Bonfire night. I mean emotionally, not literally. It's likely one of us would have noticed had the other popped back to London for a night of razzle dazzle . </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Next stop Vietnam. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Regards, </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Oliver Brown. </span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02230653032218435418noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1860489323817685614.post-49995238585178146582017-11-05T04:03:00.000-08:002018-05-29T06:02:15.371-07:00Part II - Kuta, Siem Reap, Battambang<div style="color: #454545; font-family: '.SF UI Text'; font-size: 17px; line-height: normal;">
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">When I last wrote, Grace and I were on a terrifying (wave defying) boat journey, heading for Bali's very own Sydney-on-Sea, Kuta. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">So Kuta isn't as dreadful as we had been led to believe. It's the end of the season so the atmosphere in town certainly feels calmer. Even the myriad market sellers sound weary as they holla 'yes shopping', 'morning price', 'afternoon price', 'sunset price'. NB: of course the time of day is irrelevant. Ultimately the end price will depend on how much haggle you have in you. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Wandering along the main strip, one can note the catalysts that help feed this town's reputation. Here's an example: the Sky Garden's mega deal. £5.60 will get you a BBQ with bottomless sides and salad. Oh and five hours of free booze 16:00 to 21:00!!! This is just one of a number of eateries/boozeries offering similar gluttony deals to pop you into an early bed and/or grave, on a shoestring. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">We visited a couple of coastal temples during our second Bali trip. One was called Tannah Lot*. We had read a rather damming Lonely Planet review (overpriced, overhyped) and were about to dismiss it when we realised it was a one hour moped ride away, i.e two hours of my favourite activity. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">*turns out I do tan a lot, well a bit anyway. Since visiting cremation station in the first week I've actually bronzed up proper good like. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Through past experience I always assumed my father's apparently dominant milky white gene wouldn't allow Julie's preferred Tannah Lot gene to get a look in on this trip. However it would appear I just needed more time. Time is great healer. Or skin cancer inducer. One of the two. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Thought of the Day: Amazon have named their tablet 'Kindle Fire'. This is 50% misleading. Those of you who own the original old faithful Kindle know that it allows one to read an ebook in any conditions. The Kindle Fire allows a beach goer to crank up the screen brightness to eye watering and then simply stair at their own reflection through one squinted peeper for a couple of hours, at which point the battery melts. Book worms be warned, this firey imposter is nooo a Kindle. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">This blog's got everything I hear you cry; geography lessons, puns, consumer advice. And now for some history:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Of course I was aware of the Bali bombing, 202 people lost their lives. However, at the time I was only 16 and Newsround didn't provide the in-depth analysis today's me would usually seek out following such an tragic incident. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">As well as the default emotions; sadness and sympathy there's also factual intrigue and morbid curiosity. Reading into it now I find myself once again donning my job hat; a kind of investigative deerstalker. NB: I'm not actually comparing myself to Sherlock. He got mad skills. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">With Google Earth and helicopter taken images of ground zero I worked out where our hostel was (just 200m west). The enormity of what had occurred suddenly felt accentuated by its very close proximity. In my mind, I measured the scale of destruction against the hundreds of WWII-era black and white RAF aerial photographs of Blitzed London that I used to analyze. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">The destruction reminded me of Hitler's terror weapons, the V1 cruise missile and V2 rocket. Each delivering a 1,000kg warhead to the streets of London. Sure enough, the Bali bomb comprised 12 boxes containing a cocktail of high explosives totaling 1,020kg. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Approximately 2,800 V Weapons fell on London during 1944 and 1945. And that was subsequent to the initial 1940-41 Blitz, when the Luftwaffe's bombers pounded the Capital during numerous air raids. In terms of damage sustained, these two campaigns were roughly equal in scale. Imagine living in a city subjected to >6,000 Bali bombings! It was a truly terrifying time. One largely unknown to, easily forgotten by and/or probably incomprehensible to your average 21st Century Londoner. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Anyway, I appear to have become sidetracked. Time for some news:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Tonight on Critter Watch - GrOlly discover that their wetroom drain doubles up as an access hatch for a family of cockroaches. Over the next few nights Olly dedicates an embarrassing amount of time to chasing the speedy little rascals around, cup in hand. I told them I was offering a hug in a mug, but they weren't interested/</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">listening/</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">don't have ears? </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">One of the above. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Kuta's yellow sands stretch for miles. The town is on the island's southern coast, however the beach faces west. It's almost as though the coastline rotated itself 90 degrees clockwise to provide the ultimate sunset experience. Hostelling just a short walk away, we found ourselves drawn to the flat expanses of sand at sundown on four consecutive days. Strolling through acres of inch deep warm water, listening to the rhythmical crashing of Bali's world famous surf, whilst a small orange ball disappears over the featureless blue horizon, setting fire to each cloud as it descends. Beautiful. Of course I repeatedly tainted the moment by taking a photo every minute, promising myself each time 'ok just one more'. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Bidding Bali a fond farewell, we hopped on two uneventful flights to Siem Reap (Cambodia) via Kuala Lumpur. NB: yes I will be adding Malaysia to my list of countries visited. Three hours. It still counts.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">A hostel TukTuk driver picked us up from the airport and provided us our first look at this new country. My first impression of Cambodia took me back to Africa. Bright red dirt colouring everything it touches. Tumbledown shop fronts, vibrant almost fluorescent green vegetation and every now and again a truly impressive feet of human ingenuity. I am of course talking about the guys and girls who appear to be running their own one man band removals businesses. These ex circus performers succeed in stacking, attaching, balancing what looks to be their client's entire estate onto one clapped out moped. And then, for a laugh, they actually drive off! </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">An Irish couple we bussed with had previously recommended 'the Pool Party Hostel' so we booked ourselves in. True to their word / name, our first evening turned into a pool party and we did some socialising with fellow back packers. It transpired that a Kiwi couple who worked at the hostel were massive Etherwood fans. On one occasion they flew all the way to Prague to see my old DJ friend! Embarrassingly I pretty much forced Woody to send a me a personalised video. Thanks mate, they were 'stoked'. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Thought of the Day: </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Cambodia uses both US currency and, to a lesser extent, its very own Cambodian Riel. Having never visited the States I am really enjoying using American money. Essentially pretending to be a gangster and referring to them as 'bucks'. 'How many bucks is that Grace?' etc. And repeatedly counting our massive wad of one dollar bills. Completely unnecessarily of course, i know there are eight. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">I like my history but to be honest, after you've seen Angkor Wat itself (the biggest religious monument in the world) the rest of the ruins on the Angkor tour are much of a muchness. $47 each is a lot for the same visual experience over and over. Indeed the highlight of the day was the very beginning; sitting in front of the monument at 6am as the sun rose behind it's five towers; a truly magical experience. I imagine a potentially spiritual one too, had it not have been for the few hundred additional tourists all filming the same spectacle. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">After the second stop on the tour we felt we had seen it all. Apparently determined to fuel a British stereotype in our politeness, we sat in the shade and waited until a time when we felt it acceptable to return to our TukTuk driver. I was adamant that we respect his national treasure (his nation's flag icon none the less) by pretending to have an insatiable penchant for old stone walls and statues. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Who am I kidding, I love all things stone #geologygrad08.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">In a bid to inject some fun into the afternoon I treated Grace to a short seminar on the two different sedimentary rocks used by the Kmer people to construct Angkor. However, I had to admit defeat when my lecture was suddenly upstaged by two Macaque monkeys. They sashayed over, paused to listen, presumably recognised the boredom on my audience's face and then did what any respectable couple would do in that situation. Copulate. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Typical. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">I was also a bit disappointed that the eldest of the Angkor monuments was only 900 years old. They're hardly even categorised as Ancient History, according to the UK's national curriculum. Having said that, I do enjoy a good ruin. Touching the intricately carved stone work always feels like such a tangible connection to the persons who built and used the building in question. I like my ruins like I like my women; old, grey, falling apart and sexy. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Olly's Top Tip: if you can't afford a tour guide, surreptitiously tag along on someone else's English speaking tour. NB: doesn't work with large Chinese tour groups; they all wear matching tour caps. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Critter Watch: In order to overcome my fears I've decided to keep my enemies closer. I'm in the market for an insect themed timepiece; a Critter Watch if you will. NB: I do hope you enjoyed my crowbarring-in of that jokette as much as I did. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">No? Fair enough. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Anyway, on with the show:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Tonight on Critter Watch - yet again, Olly clumsily plants foot on red ant dual carriage-way during the evening rush hour. As a result, freaks out and throws bike in a bush. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Grace strokes a cat. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">NB: Cambodian red ants are massive. They work-out. Gym bunnies, the lot of them. They wouldn't look out of place marching onto the set of Love Island, barely clad in skin-tight vests and banana hammocks, fresh from a back, sack and crack. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">In Bali people sell litre bottles of bright blue petrol on the street. In Cambodia it's the same deal however it's a dark yellowy orange colour. I'm pretty sure British Octane is dull as dish water in appearance. This is an area the U.K. could improve in. Dear* Chris Grayling MP, why not combine shocking pink fuel and transparent pipes. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">You idiot. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">All my warmest wishes. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Oliver Brown.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">*there is nothing I hold dear when it comes to our Transport Secretary. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Thought of the Day:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Which reminds me, I am really enjoying a break from the daily water-boarding of Brexit news streamed directly into my face. I've gone done it back to Brexit by doing my own exit on Brexit. Ollexibrext?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">We bussed to Battambang (Cambodia's second city) and, having done our homework, booked a full day cultural tour with the best reviewed option. Thank goodness for Trip Advisor, bringing power to the people since 2000. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">DJ's TukTuk your was a delight. Between 9am and 7pm we covered some 80km at a thrilling 20mph. We tried traditional food, met the locals and learnt about various cottage industries, obviously the most interesting being the production of rice wine. Don't be fooled by the name, this booze packs a punch; between 40 and 60% proof. The chief winer even treated us to a shot of the top shelf ops stuff, a variety marinated in three dead cobras for several days. Yum. Makes men 'strong like bull' apparently. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">DJ was full of knowledge and his personal experience of the genocide was both deeply moving and fascinating, but I won't get into that now. I've already dedicated this post to another example of death and destruction. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">At sunset, we also witnessed a remarkable site; two million bats flying out of a cave in a steady undulating stream giving new meaning to the phrase 'blind leading the blind'. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Everywhere you go in Cambodia, even right out in the sticks, there are blue signs with images of two male politicians and 'Cambodia People's Party' written beneath. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Of course my immediate assumption was that Cambodia is one of the more progressive Asian nations, being run by a gay couple in their mid-sixties.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Unfortunately, after conferring with our tour guide DJ, the signage appeared more sinister. The country's ruling party is both corrupt and unpopular. Like Russia, they have recently closed down the biggest independent media company, leaving a monopoly of state propaganda. Never a good sign. The numerous images of Cambodia's leading civil partnership peering down, keeping their eye on the populous, seems indicative of the way the country is actually governed. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Every morning in Battambang there is a cacophony of cockerel chorus. Most nail the classic line. However, there's this one guy who drunkenly staggers through the first four syllables in a high pitched gurgle, only to stop prematurely. Much like British wood pigeons do when they get distracted mid-senten... </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">(coo coooo coo coocoo etc)</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">So we've just bussed to the capital Phenomenal Penh without incident. Which is fortunate as the hostel recommended company are described on Trip Advisor as 'NEVER USE THIS BUS COMPANY!' (Jason, Melbourne).</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">We decided to gamble. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">This blog is actually a little delayed. As I post this, we have just completed four days in Incredible Biro and now we're bussing to the coast and the beautiful island paradise of Koh Rong. Angkor wat* could koh rong? </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">*thought I'd missed a trick with that monumental pun opportunity earlier didn't ya? </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Well this has been a lot longer winded than... etc etc (see Part I). </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Thanks again for listening. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">Much love. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">xxx</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">P.s why not click subscribe. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: ".sfuitext"; font-size: 17pt;">I've always wanted to say that. </span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02230653032218435418noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1860489323817685614.post-13197396694228694222017-10-25T03:57:00.000-07:002018-05-29T06:05:12.419-07:00Part I - Indoneasier<div style="color: #333333; direction: ltr; font-family: -apple-system, HelveticaNeue; font-size: 20px;">
Flew out of Heathrow at 21:30 on Monday. Arrived at our final destination, a little Balinese hippy town called Ubud, mid-afternoon on Wednesday. Knackered. </div>
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The first thing you realise is that Bali's road network is apparently lawless, a borderline chaos. I think they drive on the left here... </div>
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Our taxi driver had even stated 'I drives by my own rules'. How exciting. </div>
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For the first four days we rented a double room with an en-suite and access to a pool for £6.80 a night. SE Asia really is the region that makes long term backpacking on a shoestring possible. Although, en-suite on our budget does not<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>mean sweet suite. It means all in one, as in you can shower whilst sitting on the loo which I actually love, so the joke's on them. </div>
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In Ubud we visited the Monkey Forest, a place where a guaranteed food supply keeps some 700 monkeys in a relatively small section of forest for all us tourists to come and stare at. And stare we did, they are amazing to watch, so<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>me like. </div>
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Small and hairy. </div>
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I saw some monkeys jumping up on tourists (Grace included) to either groom their head hair or try and steal whatever was in their hands. Most victims screamed, panic laughed and generally gave the impression it was an unpleasant experience. However<span style="font-size: 20px;">, and I'm embarrassed to say, I actually went out of my way to try and be set upon. I targeted and pursued the naughty juveniles, however to no avail. Playing hard to get has never been my forte. </span></div>
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We went on a bike tour which actually meant a long drive up to a cafe in the highlands with a stunning view of Mount B... ok to be honest I can't remember the name. It's the less recently frisky of Bali's volcanoes aAfterwItdse then cycled down hill for threw hours with a few stops. One of which was a coffee plantation where we sampled the goods, including Cat poo coffee - the same overpriced stuff currently being consumed by London's elite / idiots.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>They take a cat like mammal species (again, cant remember the name) which can't digest coffee beans so poos them out. They are then collected, cleaned and roasted in the normal way. </div>
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Spoiler Alert: It tastes like regular coffee, just shitter. </div>
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My first ever go on a moped was not in ideal conditions. A rainstorm of biblical magnitude had forced our friend Robyn to abort her ride due to fear of falling off. Fair enough in Bali where the road is awash with super confident<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>native riders screaming past you. Add to that the fact that on this particular day the road was also literally awash. </div>
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Bali is a world away from the UK. As an aspiring moped rider / renter living in the latter, you would need to hold the necessary driving license. In Bali, all you need is access to 50,000RP (about £2.80), no questions asked. </div>
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Reluctantly I handed the extortionate fee to our hostel owner who pointed at a pile of helmets in the corner and motioned towards a row of five vehicles parked outside. One of his staff was busy doing pre-flight checks on the fleet,<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>which was reassuring, however, the small Hindu offering balanced on our ped's seat... not so much. Did tourists require divine assistance? Hmm. </div>
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Unlike the rest of Indonesia Bali is 95% Hindu. Everyday each household and business places a number of small offerings (tiny dried banana leaf baskets containing rice morsels, petals, even cigarettes) outside each room and the front<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>door. And yes on one occasion I did accidentally boot one into the road. Very embarrassing but completely unavoidable here. </div>
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Brimming with confidence, with Grace on the back, I took to pedding like a duck to watery Ubud. My years cycling central London's rush hour stood me in good stead. <span style="font-size: 20px;">Although, having said that, I had never given Grace a backy to work back home. </span></div>
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NB: my folks will be glad to hear that having my love ride shotgun meant I drove very cautiously indeed. </div>
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We eventually broke out of the urban gridlock and hit the open road. Rice paddies, villages, temples, banana trees flying by. 60mph on two wheels is pretty exciting I have to say (Mum&Dad see NB above). </div>
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Thought of the day: </div>
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The Balinese use of Bamboo as scaffolding pleases me. Natures perfect alternative. </div>
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We visited the Yoga Barn in Ubud, which is apparently the largest yoga studio in SE Asia. The town put on the map, in part, by the book/film Eat Pray Love. The vegan buffet was the most colourful bowl of food I had ever demolished.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
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Afterwards we did the Intro to Yoga session which was good, bit painful. A Chinese girl in short shorts frequently thrusting her bum quite sexually directly into Grace's face made me laugh. Our teacher talked a lot about energy, love, the sun, the moon, etc<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>so obviously I fell in love with her immediately; an embarrassing inevitability. </div>
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Days later I reckon Grace fell in love with a talented guitar guy who sang us a set of classics at a bar, so we're even. I certainly fell in love with him so I bloody hope she did. </div>
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Walking back through Ubud after a night on the tiles we came across an impassable mob in the street. Turns out the local temple was putting on a show in the street. I say show it was a Hindu Festival - not sure which - but it was<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>performed by hundreds of children.<br />
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For 45mins we watched the most intricate choreography, amazing costumes and singing / chanting / vocal percussion. The latter was particularly impressive. I counted some unusual time signatures and was spellbound by the coordination,<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>the spot on timing and musicianship of such a large number of kids. I tried to explain my astonishment to a fellow British couple, however as soon as Grace chipped in with 'Olly plays the drums you see' I felt like a twit and summed up. </div>
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Critter Watch:</div>
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Tonight on Critter Watch - Olly, Grace, Robyn and Dave witness a small snake chasing flies in a rice paddy. </div>
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Less on that later. </div>
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We left Ubud and got the 90min boat to Gili Trawangan, one of three tiny (Gili) islands just off Lombok. This island paradise is all about snorkeling and SCUBA so we gave both a go. </div>
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As is tradition, of course I got enormously sunburnt on Day 1. This is the closest to the equator my skin has ever journeyed so it was a real doozy. </div>
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NB: P-20 Once A Day spray does nooo do what is says on the tin. </div>
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SCUBA was both amazing and a touch scary. You really get a sense that you're taking your life in your hands. If you panic at that depth and forget your training, you could die. My experience slightly marred by a leaky mask but aside<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>from that it was incredawemazesome.</div>
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Turns out we were very fortunate indeed. Aside from three turtles which I thought would be the highlight, an enormous beast paid Grace, our Norwegian instructor and me a visit. Kris had just made the hand sign indicating<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>he wanted us to communicate our air supply to him, however when I looked back up to sign 50bar (the quantity you should terminate your dive at) he was already swimming away, eyes wide, motioning for us to follow, no species specific hand sign given...</div>
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During our training he had shown us a book of fish and mammal we might see, and the signal for each. He didn't even bother demonstrating what hand gesture meant Manta Ray. </div>
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So that was quite a thrill. Apparently they can grow up to 7m (wing span). Kris estimated ours to be a mere 3-4m, so as far as I was concerned, absolutely enormous then. Incredibly, it was only the second time he had witnessed one<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>in the wild and ridiculously coincidentally we were diving with Manta Dive School at a dive site called Manta Point. You couldn't write this stuff. </div>
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Although I have, see above. </div>
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I'm a big fan of the Gili islands. The natives are so hospitable, always smiling, always saying 'lovely jubbly' or 'core blimey' when they learn that you're from England i.e the East End of London. Also, those that know me well can<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>imagine I get pretty excited by the local Indonesian menus. Not the food derrr, the prices. Traditional main course in a backstreet Warung = £1!</div>
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'Err, in which case I'll take two then'</div>
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(one for me and one for Grace). </div>
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NB: I do actually love the food. </div>
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One point for improvement. They fling a fried egg on top of every meal they cook. Not a big problem, I can easily fling it off again. However, if there's a chronic egg surplus in Indonesia, which there clearly is, just cull the chicken<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>population and fling one of them on my plate instead. Jeez. </div>
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The islands are unique. No motorised vehicles are allowed so it's all bicycles or horse and cart. No dogs allowed, only cats (millions of them). There are also no police. Magic mushrooms are advertised in plain site and the Gilis<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>have become quite famous in this regard. </div>
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Thought of the day:</div>
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Our hostel cat recently had kittens and we're obsessed with them. I've named them One to Five. </div>
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We walked to the sunset strip of beach bars and obviously saw the most incredible sun set over Bali's distant mountains. There was a small wisp of gas emanating from Mt Agung's crater, the more recently frisky of Bali's volcanoes<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>and an archetypal Stratovolcano (#geologygrad08). I would be lying if I said there wasn't a part of me that secretly wished it erupted at that moment, right in front of our eyes. Of course that would mean inevitable death and destruction. Like I said, a part. </div>
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We paid for a snorkel trip on a glass bottomed boat with 20+ other tourists. Three different dive sites and lunch. The first and third were amazing, as there was a plethora of beautiful tropical fish at each, think Finding Nemo. So<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>incredibly close as well, they were literally eating (bread) out of my hand. </div>
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However, again my mask was letting in water. Turns out designer stubble hinders a true seal. Dam my sexy face. </div>
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At the second site, Grace and I were last off the boat due to a classic faff-fest. This proved fortuitous. Our skiff had drifted off the coral shelf and onto deeper darker water. We jumped off and were instantly treated to our own<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>private Turtle peep show, gracefully pulling itself through the water. Perfectly framed and contrasted against the homogenous blue backdrop. Magnificent. </div>
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Thought of the day:</div>
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Within the first two weeks of our trip: </div>
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- We both left our £35 a piece super filter water bottles in a bar, only to recover them hours later. </div>
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- Grace also left hers in a chemist, again recovered).</div>
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- I lost our hostel room key and had to pay for a replacement only to be handed the original later, by the cleaner. </div>
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- At the next hostel I left our room key in our door for a whole day.</div>
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- Grace's card was gobbled up by a ravenous ATM. Yum. </div>
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So yes this all bodes well. I was hoping on only loosing my dignity whilst away but it may not be that easy a ride. </div>
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After four days on Gili T, we jumped ship. Jumped on a ship and headed for Gili Air, T's little sibling. Indonesian boats are very narrow, overcrowded and the sea was very choppy that day. It was one of the scarier rides of my life.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>There was a lot of screaming and a lot of water crashing over the bows and into the packed cabin. I was reminded of a nautical phrase 'the sea is a cruel mistress'. </div>
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NB: Grace is a cool mistress. </div>
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The driver even cut the engine at one point to avoid capsizing. The couple next to me donned life jackets, a bit alarmist in my opinion. It also served to draw everyone's attention to a titanic-esque scenario, there definitely weren't<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>enough life jackets onboard. </div>
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I began singing Celine Dion's most tragic anthem (in my head). </div>
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On Gili Air we really got into beach hol mode. More snorkeling (turtles almost becoming run of the mill now - ridiculous), eating out three times a day (good food is so cheap!!!), hours of reading under the parasol... etc. So this<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>is "traveling" is it? Good. Sign me up for several more months. </div>
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Critter Watch: </div>
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Tonight on critter watch - Olly treads in red ant colony and gets bit up, Grace and Olly warm to a Gecko living in their cupboard. About the length of a Shatterproof ruler which is big for a Gecko but they are actually quite cute.<br />
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Headline - Olly sees a massive spider and s***s himself. On Booking<a dir="ltr" href="http://booking.com/" style="color: #0072c6;">.com</a><span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>Gecko Backpackers' outdoor thatched bedroom on stilts looked wild, in a good way. In reality it was wild, in a bad way. A three night fearfest. On the first evening we returned to find this monster spider<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>on our bedroom wall. Poor thing only had five legs, likely a veteran of conflicts past with previous guests. Like any proud war veteran, i imagine it craved an honorable and respectable death so with that in mind I readied one of my more sturdy flip flops.<br />
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Seriously though I do feel bad about that one, I like animals, however I'm also a borderline arachnophobe. There's no way I could have got into bed with that monster sharing our room. It had claws coming out of its face for goodness<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>sake! It made one of our big brown British house spiders look like a gorgeous angelic little infant mite. It didn't work anyway, that night Karma took the form of substantial sleep deprivation. </div>
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<a dir="ltr" href="http://booking.com/" style="color: #0072c6;">Booking.com</a><span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>is brilliant. Reverse Karma took the form of a posh little bungalow room, 60% off for two nights! It had air con, a real treat. Up till then it had been all fan-tastic (i.e not<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>fantastic). And most crucially, this upgrade was relatively spider-proof, it was indoors. </div>
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At this very moment* we are on the fast boat back to Bali. The cruel mistress is up to her usual tricks again...</div>
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and the sea is again very choppy.<br />
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*update: I thought I was going to post this last Thursday. Its now days later and said boat trip is a distant memory. </div>
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So we are on our merry way to Kuta, which by all accounts is the Magaluf of Bali. SOS...</div>
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As we want to stay relatively close to the airport for Wednesday's 6am flight to Cambodia, we have decided to endure Indonesia's answer to Falaraki, Zante, etc. It's all 'Aussies on tour' apparently. Yikes. I've already irritated Grace to the point of mention by repeatedly shouting (in a deadly accurate Aussie accent) 'Kuta mate, we're goin fackin Kuta mate'.</div>
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In summary, Indonesia is wicked. The plan was to (indon)ease ourselves into the trip with lots of beach time and that's what we've done. We had heard that it is one of the (indon)easier countries to backpack in and I agree. Certainly<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>easier than (In)(Lon)(don)(esia). </div>
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Well this has been a lot longer winded than I anticipated. I planned to simply list some key bullet points and it's turned into a ruddy geography essay of (gonna blow my own trumpet here) GCSE quality. So apologies and thanks for<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>sticking with it.<br />
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If you bailed early then I don't blame you but consider our friendship terminated. You won't read this anyway. Ha. </div>
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Actually can someone please pass on the termination comment to any premature bailers. Thank you and good day.<br />
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I was about to say I miss you all but to be honest I don't. Not yet. Still feels like a holiday. Tune in for Part II if you want to be missed. </div>
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xxx</div>
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P.s please give it up for Julie Brown. It's her birthday tomorrow. Top gal. She's made me what I am today, quite literally. </div>
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